Al Qaeda in the Islamic Magreb
Operates in the Saharan countries – mainly in southern Algeria and Libya, Mauritania, Mali and Niger. Formed from a hard-core of fighters involved in Algeria’s civil war in the 1990s, in which Islamist fighters took arms after a democratically-elected Islamic government was ousted. Briefly set up its own fiefdom in northern Mali in 2012, before being ousted by French-led security force in January 2013. Makes a living by kidnapping foreigners, earning an estimated $60m from ransoms in the last decade.